The market for MP3 players is a tough one, because it's dominated by Apple's iPod range, and also because it's a declining market, as more users opt to listen to music on their mobile phones. However, having produced a high-end Android smartphone in the shape of the Xperia S, Sony has followed up with the Android-based Z1000 touch-screen MP3 player, which was launched in September in Japan.

Walmart has struck out battling digital music rivals, but the company hopes it has more success with Vudu, the online video service that it purchased in 2010 to compete against Netflix and iTunes. Already available on the PlayStation 3 and connected HDTV and Blu-ray players, Vudu is finally catching up to the competition by adding support for the iPad today.

The MP180 is a viable pocket projector for mobile professionals thanks to its excellent image quality and useful onboard storage. However, other features such as the touchscreen and web access lack polish and seem gimmicky.

For hi-fi fans, the most depressing aspect of the digital music revolution has been the reduction in sound quality. Just when we were hoping to get better-than-CD quality sound from disc formats such as Sony's Super Audio CD (SACD) or DVD-Audio, we were hit with the double whammy of low bit-rate MP3 files and, sometimes worse, the UK's low bit-rate DAB digital radio.